Seek and find

The past week has been a mixture of good experiences and bad. I have made some good progress on my second manuscript but also endured disappointment after losing a computer file that contained hours of research. I have needed to go back and start again, and some online references have proven elusive. The worldwide web continues to expand and even an hour can change the search engine results, especially if the right combination of keywords cannot be remembered… 

This untitled digital drawing
captures the emotional complexity of my feelings.
How many different shapes can you find?
I can see a raven, a bear, an owl and a butterfly
when I focus on the orange markings.

Matthew 7:7-8 (NIV)
“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.”

These two verses from Matthew 7 are powerful influences in my life. I used them as the foundation for my research approach when I was working on my year-long Fine Arts project that concluded in 2017. In the beginning, I thought I was going to make a series of still life paintings based on a collection of found objects, and set up a strict finding protocol.
I could only spend $10 in a single visit to a shop, and each individual object could cost no more than $2.

My weekly visits to the local charity shops were profoundly rewarding, and the volunteers came to know me well and would ask how my blue collection was growing.

Here is a link to a video that I made for my second last university submission )i(

While I was collecting objects and taking hundreds of photographs looking for some new way of expressing a still life arrangement with my collected objects, I searched the internet for contemporary artists who were doing similar things. While I found very few who were painting still life arrangements, I stumbled upon a greater number of artists who were transforming everyday ordinary objects into works of art in diverse ways. That became the foundation for the multi-media performance installation that became my final outcome.

The same kinds of skills are necessary for me to write a convincing story. I am confident with character development, but my heroes and heroines need to inhabit an interesting world and have a diversity of experiences to keep me engaged. My second manuscript takes my heroine overseas, and once again I am ‘surfing the internet’ looking for inspiration…

Another of my experiments for an art project.
This one is entitled “Wounded Paper”
It is amazing where inspiration can come from )i(

Research takes up almost as much time as writing at the moment. The topics are diverse, and I am starting to build up a strong collection of helpful reference texts about the process of writing too. I will share a small sample here today. The first one is about punctuation in dialogue.

https://www.louiseharnbyproofreader.com/blog/how-to-punctuate-dialogue-in-a-novel# 

The second one is a powerful prayer
written by an accomplished author

Prayers for the Writing Life
Here is an excellent prayer that I found while I was working my way through my subscription emails. As I try to find the right steps along the writing journey I am turning more and more to the words of others who have gone this way before )i(

The third and final one is about an art theory. The abstract images I have selected for today come from my interest in finding shapes in seemingly random markings. Have you looked up at the clouds and recognised shapes. That is Gestalt.

Gestalt Theory
This final one is about an art theory.

When I told my friends God had asked me to sit down and start writing fiction, some of them were surprised. They couldn’t see the natural connections between the research and development skills that I had been perfecting during four years of university study. Neither could I.
Yet week by week, I am taken back to the art journey in my private prayer and reflections, and I am seeing more and more relevance with each passing day.

This is the unedited image of one of my
favourite found objects for my
Blue Skies:Chasing Away The Blues
research project

To conclude my post for the week I will include some of the inspirational images I have created using variations of the two art experiments and the found object. It is my prayer that my readers will have success in all their seeking and finding and make good progress on their own onward journey of discovery )i(

2 thoughts on “Seek and find”

  1. Thank you for the ping back Chrissy. Wishing you everything of the best in your research and writing. – Andi

    1. Thanks Andi. Sorry it has taken me a few days to read and respond to your comment. I finally succumbed to my first winter illness – so ironic when I am now enjoying the early spring morning.

      You are my second commenter so I am very appreciative.

      May this new season bring you new opportunities to stretch your wings and learn to fly into the post-uni life. I have had a whole year to wonder at the new me that emerged from that four-year chrysalis, and my own adventure is so much more energising than I ever imagined )i(

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